Nintendo targets Reddit pirates in piracy crackdown

My suggestion, get as many private copies of emulators you can before they go after all the Github ones. Seems to be more and more take-downs are happening lately.

It really is too bad we dont have a federated github alternative. I know theres some projects in development, but I can see the emulator scene getting harder and harder to get into if popular repos go down. Decades of work, gone.

We do have a federated GitHub alternative. Perhaps not too mature yet, but it does indeed exist. Forgejo
- I just discovered that this is Codeberg - I've seen a lot of projects there and I had no idea that it was an instance of Forgejo
- Not really federated. You can't, for example, raise issues or set PR requests from another instance.
Git is a distributed version control system. There doesn't have to be a single copy of the repo on which everything depends. It's a choice, and an understandable one, to treat one copy as authoritative, but there's no reason to despair if it becomes unavailable. Any copy of it will do.
What GitHub provides that's hard to do without it is not the repository but the stuff that goes around it: issue tracking, communication tools, discoverability, etc.
So if people take the distributed nature of Git seriously and make sure they all have a local copy of the repo, we won't lose the repo itself to Nintendo's actions. But we may lose the tools that make it easy to coordinate work on the repo.
Before we had GitHub and issue trackers we had mailing lists and Usenet groups. Not as convenient, bit they allowed people to coordinate work on open source software without a central, corporately owned point of failure. Maybe we should be looking to the early days of FOSS for ideas about how to make these projects resilient against corporate persecution. Not for the exact tools but for decentralized ways of coordinating collaboration.
- There are self hosted github alternatives, like Gitea for example. It takes 10 minutes to set up and it behaves like github/gitlab. So all to advantages can be kept.
If you (or anyone else) has any suggestions for emulators/tools to mirror, send them my way. I already have a few on my Forgejo server https://git.ngni.us/mirrors
- Don't forget to mirror suitable versions of the scarce dependencies. Sirit, the SPIR-V assembler, for example.
- Re3/revc was banned by rockstar, mirror them if theres repos left
- Emulators aren’t even grey, it’s settled law that they are legal.
Get a device or two, as well.
Your computer may very well get obsolete when it comes to software support.
A handheld or console meant to be an emulation console won't have to move through time. It'll be as it is after the day you're done setting it up, like a hacked console.
Your PC has to keep up with web standards, codecs, online goings on but dedicated, offline devices do not. I may choose an SBC to do this to, and make a copy of the partition housing the emulators and boot drive for safe keeping.
I also have two different raspberrypi emulation images. Since those are literally everywhere, it's a sure bet you'll be able to find one to put the sd card into, even years from now.
- Just don't play Nintendo games lol. That's what I do. I didn't grow up with these 'classics' and I don't feel like getting into these as an adult. 🤷‍♂️
It really is too bad we dont have a federated github alternative. I know theres some projects in development, but I can see the emulator scene getting harder and harder to get into if popular repos go down. Decades of work, gone.
There is Radicle which is a peer-to-peer forge.
Edit: Don’t expect all the features of GitHub or Forgejo though.
Stop making me sad sir!!!!
Emulators should provide torrents for releases.
Link for N64?
There is no federated guthub because git itself is. Just clone the repo - you're part of the network already!
- Microsoft can still remove all copies.
  Whereas another instance can't delete my account or comments from the instance I'm on. The most they could do is block it from theirs.
  E: no matter how much you downvote, it doesn't change the facts. GitHub is not Federated. It is owned and controlled by Microsoft. If you fork a GitHub project and host it on GitHub, Microsoft can take both down.
It really is too bad we dont have a federated github alternative.
There is no "open" alternative for... the exact reasons some code is removed from Github/Lab/Bucket/whatever.
Someone submits a DMCA request or something similar? Microsoft and so forth will process that and decide if it is valid and so forth.
If you are running your own instance? That request goes to you and you probably don't have lawyers or just the willpower to determine if it is valid or not.
And the federation approach further complicates that. Because good luck explaining the concept of federation to a judge who thinks everyone who uses a computer is a hacker and doesn't understand why a DMCA to one instance didn't propagate to your instance and why it is an honest mistake. All while the Nintendos of the world are arguing for your wages to be garnished for the rest of your life.
And the other aspect is what anyone who runs even a semi-public instance of... anything learns. People are monsters. If you have image uploads you will have CSAM.
And the last aspect is just practicality. My github is a large part of my CV. I work on projects that I think are fun AND that I think will look good to people I am trying to convince to give me a job. Emulation is already a grey area (it isn't quite porn, but it can make you look like a liability to many companies). But if you have to link someone to a complete no name site because you are trying to avoid legal action? You aren't getting hired.
- You can have an offline gitlab/forgejo and a public github. I do most of my work against a local gitlab, and mirror up to github for anything that needs to be shared.
  I have a couple of projects mirrored down to my gitlab as a backup, and they are not online, so can't realistically be DCMAd.

People are missing the point of this article a bit - It's not just about Nintendo trying to remove forks/backups of yuzu/ryujinx. It's that they are trying to subpoena Reddit as a corporation for user data. They want to pursue legal actions against anyone discussing Switch Piracy online. And then ask yourself - Do you trust Reddit as a corporation with your user data?

In addition to requesting records from Reddit, Nintendo's filing also makes appeals for information from other companies, including domain registrars such as Namecheap and GoDaddy, along with firms such as Cloudflare, Github, Google, and Discord.

Reminder, that you do not own your social media accounts and that corporations might end up sharing whatever you post online with whomever. Privacy and anonymity are not guaranteed.

So, Lemmy is a better place?
- Well… it’s all public anyway so no need to make a request. Just scrape it.
- Depends on which instance you use for your client, I would say. For me only discuss.tchncs.de gets to see my IP address, and Milan Ihl, our admin, as well as his Lemmy server, are in Germany.
  This means two things:
  You can shop for a location of home instance that you deem Nintendo-safe
  Nintendo would have to multiply its legal efforts many times over and through different jurisdictions if they wanted to get all users of a community, which might affect their effort-value-considerations.
  But I've probably doxxed myself with personal stories. Pretty sure a dedicated person could find my employer, the team I'm in, and my age.
I always wondered what data does reddit actually have? Even if they had IPs and people posting, I'm John Smith, how exactly is Nintendo going to prove anything in a court of law? IP is not a person, and talking about shit online isn't the same as doing it.
And most of all, are they going to sue and investigate 10,000 people?
I don't get any of this fear mongering. I think this is all just aimed at shutting down communication channels, they aren't going to go after individuals talking on the internet
_

Source code too?
- I keep some of the devs in my basement.

The big ones:

Now Nintendo is seeking the court’s approval to actually subpoena Reddit for user records. These records, if shared, could identify additional moderators or users tied to the r/SwitchPirates subreddits. Nintendo argues that these records are critical to building their case against others in the alleged piracy ...

In addition to requesting records from Reddit, Nintendo's filing also makes appeals for information from other companies, including domain registrars such as Namecheap and GoDaddy, along with firms such as Cloudflare, Github, Google, and Discord.

Kinda weird that I'm rooting for reddit, a company I hate, against Nintendo, a company that usually brings me joy.
But here we are.
- Any time Nintendo is involved in a legal case, you can pretty safely assume they're probably wrong.
- As a lifelong Nintendo fan, I've been rooting against them in pretty much everything for close to a decade at this point.
Subpoenaing Reddit for user records because some guy emulated a videogame made for your crappy handheld console.

Target them all you want, the links are on gdrive and mega and the owners will just move to advertising them somewhere else, Tumblr, throwaway eBay listings, Spotify playlists,... here.

Entire romsets for gb, gbc, gba, N64, SNES, etc have all been on piratebay for over a decade, not to mention the 4-5 300Gb+ curated sets out there... wherever they are.

Good luck there, Nintenbros. Keep swinging that axe. We'll keep growing heads.

It also helps that the golden age is over and each system now only gets around 10 or so exclusives worth a shit so there's less Switch games needed for a good set compared to past generations. Thanks, Nintendo. Quality over quantity.

The main thing they are trying to do is make it more difficult to find this stuff via google, which tbh is still easy without reddit.
But even Switch homebrew has been a pain. Most of it is one off software made years ago because no sane dev wanted to actually keep up with all the firmware releases and limited control of CFW. Github/Gitlab repos keep getting banned left and right for tools not even related to piracy.
3DS has full fledged apps with teams behind everything and HShop which makes it very easy for everyone. Switch still doesn't have a definitive method of handling NSP/XCIs, and all the auto download internet repos are invite only to hide from Nintendo.
I'm really hoping someone finds some serious hardware bypass in their next console after what they did to the emulation scene. They really deserve to go through the insane R4 piracy age all over again for nuking everything online.
advertising them somewhere else, Tumblr, throwaway eBay listings, Spotify playlists,... here.
You missed a great opportunity to have 'here' be a link to an emulator.
- ....Good idea.
Not to mention discord channels you have to be invited to.
It also helps that the golden age is over
Even the stone age is coming to an end - in favor of clay dicks. Talking about games.

I don’t think that it is illegal to talk about illegal stuff 🤔 but maybe in some countries, it is, who knows, at least not where I live

"Conspiracy to ___"
- Conspiracy to blank requires at least one overt action, demonstrating that you intend to fulfill your commitment to blank.
  We could talk about doing blank all day, make plans to blank. Draw up little blank maps and assign blank duties. Until someone actually does something, it's all just talk.

Those dumbass mods at /r/piracy censoring the shit out of everyone to not post links and be uselessly vague to prevent from being taken down, and still get taken down even after all that stupid self censoring, is catharsis for me and ironic for them because it was useless to everyone that tried to look for help there since they deterred anyone from directly linking or name dropping sites or discord channels to locate piracy content. Even their wiki was dogshit useless.

So, good. Fuck them. They deserve it. Don't self censor, don't be vague, don't discourage actual piracy. Which is what they did there. Fuck them. Fuck reddit.

Yeah I don't get certain sub rules. For example on the VPN subreddit you couldn't ask about or name ANY VPN companies. Like, what!? Then what the hell are we here for!?
- I wonder if their intent was to help people find a good VPN or to be the place people who want to find a VPN go and then give up looking for one.
  Seems like the best way to get people to hate something isn't by going around telling people that they should hate it. It's by becoming a spokesman for that thing and telling people they should love it while making them hate you (and everything associated with you).
I got banned from /r/Gaming years ago because in a thread about playstation emulation, I just mentioned what .BIN file is needed for the BIOS after someone asked, with a list of the files they were already looking at on a download site, because they were confused. They're own rules explicitly state discussion of emulation is okay, but direct links are not.
I think the self-censoring was moreso out of concern for upsetting the Reddit admins than it was for companies like Nintendo.
- Does your hypothesis change how you think about either of them?

Nintendo goes on to claim that this subreddit has played a central role in fostering Switch piracy,

Piracy has been long ago defined to be a service problem. Nintendo should be suing themselves. I hope the lawyers eat it all up.

So what? Nintendo expects us to wait for their lazy asses to release older games?

At full price and only in the switch
And don't pirate it please we are the good guys here
-Nintendo probably
Not only that. In South America, it is impossible to legally purchase digital Nintendo games. The only options are: overpriced physical copies (like, 2 or 3 times the original value), or create a US account (so, lying in the personal data) and buy prepaid cards online (also severely overpriced).
For some people, piracy is the only option.
They’ve released like 1% of the NES library on Switch and it’s been years.